The Marriage Plot, Vol 2

Posted by Guest Writer in WBN News & Events      7 comments

Feb
21

Editor’s Note: This is the second installment of our discussion of February’s Book Club selection, Jeffrey Eugenides’s The Marriage Plot. Find the first one here. The next post, on February 28, will cover the sections titled “And Sometimes They Were Very Sad” and “The Bachelorette’s Survival Kit.”

If you’re not yet a book club member and would like to be, it’s not too late to jump on the bandwagon. Simply use the comments section below to express interest and join us on our next adventure, Elif Shafak’s The Bastard of Istanbul. Leah Kaminsky will lead this discussion, and the schedule goes as follows:

And now, Jenna Cooper’s thoughts on sections three and four of The Marriage Plot. In your comments, feel free to respond to the questions Jenna poses, or raise new talking points and questions to toss around. And don’t forget to tick the “Notify me of followup comments via e-mail” box below to stay engaged with the conversation. DD

“A Brilliant Move” is an unorthodox chapter in the context of “marriage plot” novels. Normally we aren’t privy to the inner world of the “object of desire.” It’s like getting to see inside the mind of Mr. Darcy or Heathcliff, reading what makes the enigmatic Leonard tick. “A Brilliant Move” makes a departure from the previous two chapters, which were theory-heavy, yet lighthearted in comparison to “A Brilliant Move.” All three protagonists have challenges navigating the post-college world, but Leonard has the burden of doing so with a mental illness and no familial support.

As I read this chapter, I felt engulfed by Leonard’s desperate fight against his own mind. “A Brilliant Move” made me think of the thoughts Mitchell had regarding Tolstoy. Leonard is the “man clutching the branch” (204) and his chapter used “metaphorical language to describe an ineffable, but real experience.” The writing “reached through the noise of life to grab [me] by the collar and speak only of the truest things” (203). How did you feel while reading “A Brilliant Move”? Did you feel that the chapter “spoke only of the truest things” or did the metaphors fall flat for you?

The subversive stream of consciousness writing and extended metaphors Eugenides uses in “A Brilliant Move” impressed me with their originality and occasional startling rawness. “All alone in his splendid apartment, among the geniuses and would-be geniuses, at the end of the spiraling land” touched me for its poignant eloquence (270), and the description of how medication blunts emotional pain on page 282 is spot-on in describing that phenomenon. If you’ve ever taken medication that affects your emotional receptiveness (even antihistamines and pain killers can dull your feelings), you can probably remember that it feels like “squeezing a baggie full of water and feeling all the properties without getting wet.” Also, anyone else pretty disturbed that Leonard’s parents made him eat his own feces? Made me wonder what other repressed traumas Leonard harbors.

On another note, the intimate glimpses into the lives of people outside the circles of the affluent and Ivy League educated in “A Brilliant Move” and “Asleep in the Lord” made this week’s read richer. Darlene’s story saddened me—there was a woman who did everything in her power to reclaim her life and she eventually relapsed. It’s a stark reminder that “mind over matter” isn’t easy. Growing up in America, you’re taught that you can achieve anything if you put your mind to it, but the mind can fail us despite our endeavors. In Calcutta, Mitchell witnesses the helplessness of the patients in Mother Teresa’s Home for the Dying. The only hope presented to the patients is that their death will unite them with Christ. But how many patients were believers? For the non-believer, the Home for the Dying might have felt like its own little hell. I think Mitchell fled because he saw futility in what they were doing at the home. Despite his desire for self-abnegation, Mitchell embraced his Nietzschean side and abandoned the home for the “bright fallen world above” (321). What do you think Leonard and Mitchell learned or gained from their interactions with people whose situations are seemingly hopeless? How do you think their perspectives on their own lives alter?

Finally, I was both amused and and happy for Mitchell when he reached epiphanies while stoned off his ass, roaming the streets of Calcutta. Mitchell finally lays it on the line with Madeleine and feels religious ecstaticism—the Jesus Prayer “had taken over and was saying itself in his heart” (327). All while he was on high on a bhang lassi. I thought that was pretty bold of Eugenides, particularly because it was such a believable climatic moment and I, as the reader, trusted that Mitchell reached some healthy conclusions. Humans have used drugs to create and enhance religious experiences for who knows how many years, but this was during the eighties. Nancy Reagan started her “Just Say No” campaign in 1982, the year the novel takes place, and the War on Drugs was gaining momentum. Ironic? Do you think this might have been tongue-in-cheek of Eugenides or perhaps an acceptance that altered states of consciousness can allow one to reach clear-sighted conclusions? Or both?

In addition to writing for WriteByNight’s blog, Jenna Cooper writes for BE Mag and a blog called FemThreads. Aside from writing, Jenna served as an AmeriCorps Member from 2008-2010 and will start her M.S. in Information Studies in Fall 2012. She graduated in 2009 with a B.A. in English from the University of Texas